Flight to Mars takes off at the Showbox

Mike McCready has been publicly battling Chron’s disease for decades. Ten years ago he got together with some friends — Tim DiJulio (guitar), Gary Westlake (bass), Mike Musburger (drums), Ty Bailie (keyboards) and Paul Passereli (vocals) to be specific — and formed the UFO tribute band Flight To Mars. The group plays annual fund-raising concerts in Seattle that benefit Chron’s and Colitis Foundation and this year they took their show on the road for a brief eight-date west coast tour.

Wednesday night the Flight to Mars gang capped off that tour with a show that celebrated its 10-year run of raising money and awareness for the CCFA while rocking out at the Showbox. The evening featured several guest appearances and lots of exciting moments. More on those in a minute.

Flight To Mars, the main attraction of the night, was pumped up 1970s stadium rock crammed into the small confines of the Showbox complete with heavy use of a smoke machine, lasers and a gong. The entire band seemed to play into their roles well and it was highly apparent that while musicianship was important the main emphasis was on having fun. That’s not to say the musicianship wasn’t top-notch. It was quite the opposite as the band was as tight as any tribute band I’ve seen. The rhythm section of Westlake and Musburger was solid, Passereli relished his role as Phil Moog and DiJuio, who seriously has to be one of the most underrated guitarists in Seattle, laid down some serious facemelters.

Of course when your tribute band contains a member of Pearl Jam a lot of the focus is going to be on him and for his part McCready delivered quite a show. McCready is a relatively animated guitarist when playing with Pearl Jam but the music often doesn’t afford him many opportunities to let loose. In Flight To Mars a slightly more playful side of McCready is visible.